Melrose pursues grant to increase transportation connectivity

Melrose is taking advantage of a state grant aimed at making municipalities more safe and convenient for pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists.

The Complete Streets program, sponsored by the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, provides funding for public infrastructure projects aimed at increasing connectivity in municipalities like Melrose.

In June 2016 Mayor Rob Dolan signed the city’s Complete Streets policy, and the city is now in the midst of gathering data and building a list of 15 projects it hopes will be funded by the state under the Complete Streets program.

“The big picture vision is to connect people from where they’re starting to where they want to go – business districts, schools, train stations, the library, the senior center,” said City Engineer Elena Proakis Ellis, who is spearheading the city’s Complete Streets effort. “A ‘complete street’ is intended to allow for all modes of transportation and provide accommodations for all ages and abilities.”

A chance to update data

Though the city could come up with a list of 15 projects to submit to the state by assessing need anecdotally, Melrose is waiting to identify priority projects until it collects more data.

Proakis Ellis said the city is using the Complete Streets program as an opportunity to update its geographic information system (GIS) – an undertaking she says will inform a multitude of city projects ranging from street paving to day-to-day operations at DPW.

“We thought that one area where the city was lacking was in the baseline data for a lot of these metrics,” Proakis Ellis said. “For instance, we have GIS data for sidewalks but we’re not sure how up to date it is. We don’t have a layer for street signs, we don’t have a layer for pavement markings, we don’t have one for traffic signals.”

Before submitting a list of 15 priority projects to MassDOT, the city will be working with internal departments and outside vendors to fill the city’s GIS with the most current data, Proakis Ellis said.

“We thought that the best way to really look at connectivity in the city was to gather a wealth of baseline data, get it all into the GIS and then use that to identify and prioritize projects,” she said.

A recent condition assessment of every Melrose road conducted by the engineering department, a free citywide bike-ability assessment by the Massachusetts Bicycle Coalition and a free Walk Boston and Watson Active assessment on accessibility of Melrose schools for pedestrians and bicyclists will all be entered into the GIS before the city determines its priority projects for Complete Streets.

“Those assessments aren’t going to be done until the end of this month and we want those to feed into the Complete Streets prioritization plan,” Proakis Ellis said. “We need to do some vetting to make sure it’s all set and then we’ll be making [that data] public.”

Choosing priority projects

Once the data is up to date, city employees and community stakeholders will focus on identifying 15 priority projects with the help of a consultant – Beta Group.

Beta Group, whose $49,700 contract is being funded by MassDOT, will use city data and public input collected in 2016 to compile a list of 30 potential projects. In partnership with a Complete Streets working group made up of city officials, members of the public and school district representatives, Beta Group will then pare that list down to 20 projects.

Soon after, sometime this spring, the city will host a public meeting to gather further public input on the potential projects before arriving at the final list of 15 projects. Beta Group will then take that list and come up with cost estimates for each project on the list.

By June 30, Melrose will submit the chosen projects to MassDOT, Proakis Ellis said.

When the project prioritization plan is approved by the state, Melrose will then select which projects of the 15 projects it would like to be funded by the state in fiscal 2018.

The state has committed to providing up to $400,000 worth of funding for Complete Streets projects in fiscal 2018, so the city could choose multiple projects with low cost estimates or a few projects with higher dollar values, Proakis Ellis said.

“They don’t approve everything,” she said. “We’re going to have 15 projects on the list, but if we get two or three of them constructed, that would be good. It’s becoming more and more competitive because more communities have finished their policies.”

Smart growth and Complete Streets

The Complete Streets projects will mesh well with the city’s focus on smart growth and development, Proakis Ellis said.

“I think there will be certainly a lot of attention paid to a lot of the same areas,” Proakis Ellis said, adding that the city’s rail corridor is central to both smart growth and connectivity.

“I think we’re already starting off on the right foot, so it’s just a matter of looking for where there are gaps in this network and then making sure we can plan accommodations for them,” Proakis Ellis said. “When people have an easy way to get from their home to those places, they will use them so much more than if they can’t walk there.”

Proakis Ellis said the city will be advocating for projects that positively impact a large percentage of Melrosians.

“We want to implement projects that people want to see, that are going to help people directly, that are going to help people cross streets safely, get to parks safely, get to school safely, bike to the commuter rail or Oak Grove safely,” she said. “We want these projects to be feel-good projects.”